Image: JD Vance (U.S. Senator JD Vance speaking with attendees at the People’s Convention at Huntington Place in Detroit, Michigan) via Gage Skidmore (Flickr)
It’s officially October, which means the resurgence of all things spooky and scary: ghouls, goblins and Republican policy. Indeed, as the leaves begin to change, and we feel a slight crisp in the air, us Pennsylvanians have found ourselves in the center of a no-holds-barred political battle for yet another election year. The Keystone State and its 19 electoral votes could very well be the tipping point in the presidential race. As such, both campaigns have aggressively barnstormed around the Commonwealth and bought up hundreds of millions of dollars in ad space in thinly veiled attempts at winning the biggest electoral prize in the nation. Their primary method? Appeal to moderates. Vice President Kamala Harris has repeated the sentiment that this year’s Democratic coalition is a wide tent. From the casinos of the Las Vegas Strip to the farmlands of Lancaster County, the Harris-Walz ticket has been seemingly successful in rallying a diverse, politically moderate (albeit left-leaning) base. Of course, many of these people will be using their vote not only as an endorsement of the vice president, but also as a condemnation of Donald Trump, the Republican nominee for the third consecutive election. Trump, ostensibly, is not a well man. The now 78-year-old candidate seemingly cannot help but continue to plummet into a far-right death spiral. Several laughable claims, all false and radical in equal measure, have made headlines over the past weeks and months. From cats and dogs being eaten by Ohio immigrants to post-birth abortions, the former president seemingly no longer lives in our reality. He also claimed recently that he has a better beach body than Joe Biden, and that Harris is “mentally disabled” — a bold description of someone he lost a 90-minute debate to.
This being the case, JD Vance, as he took the podium in last Tuesday’s vice presidential debate, had a Herculean task before him: make Trump’s policies seem not totally insane. It’s a job the Yale-educated Ohio senator took in stride, as he’s been the personal mouthpiece and translator for the former president’s claims, however unhinged they may be. It’s clear that his debate performance came with the distinct focuses of presentation and framing, both in service of trying to sway the undecided voter. Suddenly, in front of the CBS cameras and a nation of attentive viewers, Trump’s draconian policies seemed to become a lot more obtuse, moderate and maybe even digestible.
A Trump administration, Vance proclaimed, would be, “Pro-family in the fullest sense of the word,” and that In-Vitro Fertilization (IVF) would be protected. He emphasized that winning back the trust of women was a goal of the campaign, while implicitly defending the Supreme Court’s overturning of Roe v. Wade. Vance articulated that decisions on abortion policy should be left up to voters in their individual states, citing the “diversity” of our nation. But why, ultimately, do Republicans feel that they have lost the trust of female voters? Can they remedy this in any reasonable way?
To accurately contextualize the comments of JD Vance in this debate, we need to look at the plain facts regarding the policy propositions and statements of Trump, for whom, let’s face it, the vice presidential nominee is merely a surrogate.
Trump has said that he “did a great service” by appointing the Supreme Court Justices who decided to strike down Roe v. Wade, commending their “genius and heart and strength.” Following the cataclysmic 2022 decision, 20 states now have post-Roe abortion bans. And let’s be very clear about one thing: abortion bans kill women. In Texas, maternal mortalities skyrocketed by 56% following the state’s new restrictions. Regardless of your personal conviction, it is morally necessary to recognize that abortion is a medical procedure, no different than an appendix removal or a kidney transplant. Without reproductive healthcare, women die. So, can women trust the party that has wrought this chaos upon a fundamental human right? The evidence speaks for itself.
Vance further defended Trump’s comments on healthcare at large from the presidential debate, during which he said that he had “concepts of a plan.” Vance claimed that, had Trump recited his full policy, it would have been boring. Deep dive, fine print analyses of policy is not, and has never been, the expectation in a presidential debate. Harris detailed numerous policy proposals during the course of her debate performance without ever getting too into the weeds or uninteresting. Suffice to say, if Trump had a healthcare plan, he would have told us. Believe him when he says that he only has “concepts.”
Contrary to Vance’s claims, Trump did not save the Affordable Care Act, commonly known as Obamacare. ABC reports that, in 2017, Donald Trump backed a Congressional attempt to repeal the ACA, an effort that was stopped with John McCain’s crucial vote against the measure. He also, in 2020, brought the ACA before the Supreme Court as an unconstitutional piece of legislation. On the 2024 campaign trial, Trump has continued to demonize Obamacare, vowing to replace it.
The ACA provides affordable health care to Americans, particularly those with pre-existing conditions such as asthma or diabetes. Donald Trump’s proclamation that he will dismantle such a system in favor of “concepts of a plan” is an inhumane grift.
Vance also, in the course of his debate performance, routinely disparaged immigrants living in the US. He blamed Harris, the so-called “Border Czar,” for letting in millions of “illegal aliens.” Setting aside the obviously dehumanizing rhetoric being employed here, Vance’s claims on immigrants and their effect on the economy are baseless.
First of all, let’s acknowledge the bipartisan border bill. This was an extensive piece of legislation which would have provided massive regulatory overhauls to the US-Mexico border and was endorsed by the U.S. Border Patrol. Despite the fact that this was a bill drafted in partisan cooperation, including some of the Senate’s most conservative members, Trump ordered his congressional allies to kill the bill, believing that it would have deprived him of an electoral issue to run on. As such, the narrative that Democrats have done nothing about the border is flagrantly and laughably false. The U.S. — as of right now, at least — is not an autocracy. The president, and certainly not the vice president, cannot unilaterally pass legislation without the consent of Congress. We all took a high school government class. We all know this.
Vance also told us that immigrants are taking American jobs. Is this true? Nope. NPR reports that “The share of working-age men who were in the workforce in August was 89.5% — higher than all but one month during the Trump administration. The share of working-age women who were in the workforce last month was the highest ever — 78.4%.” Not only are immigrants not taking jobs from citizens, but more Americans are at work today than they ever were during the Trump administration. NPR adds that without the contributions of immigrant labor, the U.S. economy would “likely be shrinking.” Despite what this data tells us, Vance reaffirmed in the debate Trump’s plan to forcibly remove 11 million undocumented immigrants from the U.S. using the National Guard and local police forces. This would constitute one of the largest displacements of human beings in world history.
Housing is another issue that is deeply concerning to many Americans, particularly students and young professionals. Incidentally, it is another crisis for which Vance blames immigrants.
The housing shortage in America is a complex and multidimensional issue, but one thing is pretty clear when you look at the information: Vance’s assertion that immigrants are to blame falls flat on its face. CBS reports that a very literal shortage of physical homes in the United States is responsible for unaffordability, brought on by a large reduction in home construction that followed the 2008 financial crisis. The most ironic part about this? One third of those who work in construction are immigrants. Ousting these workers, as is a part of Trump’s aforementioned mass deportation plan, would very likely have the exact opposite of the intended effect. Home construction may become even more sparse, and prices would continue to rise. There is very little evidence that immigration drives up rent prices in financially significant ways. CBS cites a study from 2017 by ScienceDirect which found that a 1% increase in an area’s immigration rate can lead to a 0.8% increase in rent. This small bump is unlikely to compare to the potential consequences of a construction industry that would be stripped of a third of its workforce, crippling the ability to build new homes and satisfy demand.
As has been the norm for Vance, unfounded vilification of immigrants is central to his ticket’s platform. When he is stripped of his mistruths and lies, as is our civic responsibility to do so, he very quickly comes to represent nothing but hate.
Near the end of the night, Vance and Governor Tim Walz had a heated back-and-forth about the state of American democracy — a topic and point of discussion which is very possibly the most monumentally consequential issue that came up in the debate.
Vance has proudly claimed that, had he been in Mike Pence’s situation on Jan. 6, 2021, he would have encouraged that alternative electors be sent to Congress, effectively extinguishing the democratic process and throwing out the vote of the American people.
In this late stage of the debate, Walz asked Vance a very simple yes or no question: Did Trump lose the 2020 election?
His response was “Tim, I’m focused on the future. Did Kamala Harris censor Americans from speaking their mind in the wake of the 2020 Covid situation?”
Quick aside: Biden nor Harris engaged in any such behavior. The Huffington Post reports that earlier this year, the Supreme Court threw out a case brought forward by social media users and two Republican state attorneys general, which related to the supposed misconduct referenced by Vance. They claimed that the Biden administration had violated their First Amendment rights by encouraging social media platforms to moderate COVID-19 related misinformation. Amy Coney Barett, a Trump appointee, wrote in her majority opinion that there was no evidence which supported the accusation that the government actually influenced the content policies of any social media companies. Harris did not “censor Americans” during the COVID-19 pandemic. This is a weak attempt at misdirection by Vance.
Back to the main point: Vance refused to admit that Trump indeed lost the 2020 election, an outcome which was confirmed by every single Republican governor, as the moderators mentioned. “That’s a damning non-answer,” commented a visually stunned Walz. Trump did, for the record, lose in 2020.
ABC News reports that “State and federal courts have dismissed more than 50 lawsuits across six states,” all firmly denying the claim that the 2020 election was fraudulent or stolen in any capacity. Furthermore, AP News reported that they found “Fewer than 475 cases of voter fraud in six battleground states during the 2020 presidential election — a number far too little to have made any difference in the outcome of that election.” For reference, Trump had asked Georgia’s secretary of state to “find” him 11,780 votes to put him ahead in the state, according to the New York Times. Voter fraud is not a widespread problem, and it does not affect election outcomes. Trump lost the 2020 election, and Vance is a cowardly lap dog for refusing to admit it.
Trump and Vance are asking for your vote this election, but what have they done to earn it? What policies have they promoted that convinces you they will fight for ordinary Americans? Your vote isn’t just a tool, nor is it merely a right. Your vote is a moral obligation to this nation. I believe that the United States of America is the greatest country on Earth. We are a nation of dreamers, idealists and barrier-breakers. This is who we are. America is diverse, progressive and unafraid, and we are better because we are those things. Trump and Vance are not representative of these characteristics and aspirations. They want to drag us back to a time when we feared those different to us and discarded the truth in favor of comfortable lies. A lie, however big, cannot cover up the ugly tumor that is Trumpism. For those who believe in the promise of America, a long and tough examination of this moment is absolutely critical. Will you choose to be on the side of history that is looked upon favorably?
At this moment, I’m reminded of something Vance and I can actually agree on. In Oct. 2016, he wrote, “Trump makes people I care about afraid. […] Because of this I find him reprehensible.”
When you step into that booth on Nov. 5, think about those people. They’re your family, your friends, your neighbors –- and Trump scares the living hell out of them. Vote accordingly.
Carlo Constantine is a third-year Political Science major with a minor in Journalism.